What happens if a random person not actively involved with NEM submits templates? Does MS own NEM then? That could happen any day, because anyone can submit templates.

Technically, if you look at the agreement, he has breached it. He is in trouble.

I did, nowhere does it say that.You have to have the rights to the code you submit (which are the templates).The "Employer" passages are for the cases where you are an employee for a company and your employer owns the code you write, so you need persmission. Someone who doesn't work for NEM and codes his own templates didn't violate the agreement.

This matter has been sought with two lawyers. Both think that it is at best ambiguous, which ties in very much with my conclusion. We can argue until the cows come home, but as one who has been around in business for the longest time and have seen many more agreements in my life, I have no doubt in my mind that the agreement was structured for their benefit, i.e., ambiguous enough to turn things around when they want to.

If NEM was a shit coin, they won't care. But if NEM becomes a hot property, that is when NEM will be slaughtered using this agreement.

Please refrain from saying that if Ethereum did that then, there shouldn't be a problem. I would say that is what 99% of the population will think. I belong to the 1% who will look specifically at the problem without trying to be influenced by anything else.

The problem here is the agreement and how all this is structured, not whether Ethereum has signed or not. Good luck to them. The agreement is explicit enough to show ambiguity.

Please do not conclude in what you want to believe it to be. If your command of law lexicon and innuendos is absent, don't even contemplate on making any conclusion.

In the absence of any legal knowledge, the power of your English Language is important. And in law, the use of the language is so important that you need to really understand beyond what a simple word can mean, and how this very word should be read in its entirety, within the context of the agreement.

In the context of the entire agreement, the Project can be called NEM and in the context of the entire agreement, it can mean to say that MS can take full rights of it, i.e., NEM to be given away free. You can argue about it, but the ambiguity is there. If there is ambiguity, there is room for exploitation, and exploit they will.

I only need to ask one question. If they are sincere, then let's make it very clear. If not, I do not believe the agreement is done in all sincerity.

The fact that we write pages about this shows its ambiguity. It is so easy to judge from what has transpired in the last couple of days.

I guarantee it.

This is just basic economics and greed. It's just the way it is. I think when dealing with large, established companies agreements like this you've got to read extremely carefully - regardless of that companies reputation, good or bad.

I am thankful though that some prominent members of the NEM team recognize this.

What happens if a random person not actively involved with NEM submits templates? Does MS own NEM then? That could happen any day, because anyone can submit templates.

Technically, if you look at the agreement, he has breached it. He is in trouble.

I did, nowhere does it say that.You have to have the rights to the code you submit (which are the templates).The "Employer" passages are for the cases where you are an employee for a company and your employer owns the code you write, so you need persmission. Someone who doesn't work for NEM and codes his own templates didn't violate the agreement.

You have made one assumption, that is, the agreement is only about the templates. The contention here is the ambiguity of the agreement which may or may not include all of the NEM code.

If it means all of NEM code and the person claimed to have submitted that in his/her submission as his, then he/she is in breach.

If you believe it does not mean all of NEM code and I am not sure about it, which I am not sure really, then there is already ambiguity. You can call me paranoid or anything, but the fact is, I work on certainty, i.e., let's make it 100% certain that we are talking about the templates, and the templates alone. Nothing else.

Then I am agreeable. Otherwise, I don't want to live to regret this very day just because someone says it does not include NEM code.

If you look at the agreement, it was generated in 2012. All I can say is, this is one contract agreement that has been sharpened and reiterated multiple times by people who are far more intelligent than all of us put together, and they are lawyers. Most of us here are just speculators and coders with limited life and business experiences.

It doesn't mean Microsoft would own NEM. It just doesn't guys, so you can stop posting all the Microsoft fine print.

Then why do you supposed a mega corporation has interest in an open source project that is crowdfunded and could very well be a huge competitor in the future?

Don't forget how they have been brought up on claims of becoming a monopoly and buying out early start ups before.

Don't forget how Windows 10 is free but on the cost of sending your information back to central servers for who knows what.

Ok, so you're guessing.

So their plot is to steal all the altcoins?

No

I don't think it is too far off to have the thought that Microsoft is attempting to grab up altcoins or see the code or whatever else. Why has Microsoft been so quiet about bitcoin forever and are now super supportive of alts, some of them are even crap. At first it sounded good but now that they are adding everyone that applies it is speculative what their intentions are.

At the end of the day these big companies realize that bitcoin / blockchain / alts were created by someone other than themselves and they are in a scrambling phase to see how they can get a piece. Good luck getting a piece of decentralization.

Becoming added to the Microsoft Azure platform would have given Microsoft the right to “grant Microsoft, and those who receive the Code (means the computer software code, whether in human readable or machine executable form, that is delivered by You to Microsoft under this Agreement ) directly or indirectly from Microsoft, a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, irrevocable license..

(Strong-text added.)

Not a problem if the code is open source. If you're worried, just make sure the code is licensed under GNU rather than the MIT license. The right GNU license obliges Microsoft to pass along the source code, including the source code of any modifications they make.

It doesn't mean Microsoft would own NEM. It just doesn't guys, so you can stop posting all the Microsoft fine print.

Then why do you supposed a mega corporation has interest in an open source project that is crowdfunded and could very well be a huge competitor in the future?

Don't forget how they have been brought up on claims of becoming a monopoly and buying out early start ups before.

Don't forget how Windows 10 is free but on the cost of sending your information back to central servers for who knows what.

Ok, so you're guessing.

So their plot is to steal all the altcoins?

No

I don't think it is too far off to have the thought that Microsoft is attempting to grab up altcoins or see the code or whatever else. Why has Microsoft been so quiet about bitcoin forever and are now super supportive of alts, some of them are even crap. At first it sounded good but now that they are adding everyone that applies it is speculative what their intentions are.

At the end of the day these big companies realize that bitcoin / blockchain / alts were created by someone other than themselves and they are in a scrambling phase to see how they can get a piece. Good luck getting a piece of decentralization.

I totally feel the same.I simply cant trust Microsoft anymore.What is the main benefit if we jump on Azure anyway?Alot of these projects by M$ usually end up a total fail anyway.

At the end of the day these big companies realize that bitcoin / blockchain / alts were created by someone other than themselves and they are in a scrambling phase to see how they can get a piece. Good luck getting a piece of decentralization.

Although i agree with your view, i disagree with the decentralization comment.

Centralization is unfortunately an unavoidable outcome - it's how, and how much, that matters - Whether it be the centralization of wealth (Coins) in any one few peoples hands (Unavoidable), or the centralization of mining power (In the case of bitcoin). Hence i'm not too keen on POW as people often overlook the mining power aspect and the repercussions this will have on bitcoins "Trustless" ledger as a whole (51% attack, for example).

The centralization of POW is already an issue, with only large investors and companies now either mining, or profiting from creating mining technology, or mining pool owners calling the shots. I believe this will give them the same powers of exploit we see from FIAT banks today. This is not acceptable from a new and "revolutionary" financial tool. In fact I think this is just much more sinister and misleading.

I like to view centralization similar to liberty or equality. Small amounts is advantageous - Too much liberty = anarchy or discord - not good for society. Likewise too much centralization = monopoly, corruption. Equality? = Self entitlement, greed.......too much of anything is naive and dangerous.

There's a fine line. A line that gets increasingly blurred as economic troubles (Triggered by dishonest money) spur on political disorder from a steadily impoverished populace. Not only do we need to seperate the banks/business from state (Took us long enough to do so for the Church) We also need to reinstate some honest money. I think Crypto can do it, Bitcoin was the test, but it's definitely not the end.

How my view correlates to the subject at hand though; I think Microsoft is, typically, trying to horde as much as they can with these obscure agreements and it's dangerous for small developing crypto markets, and it won't bode well for the future unless a better, less ambiguous agreement can be proposed.

I agree.We still have to ask ourselves if we really need it or not?does anyone know if BTC has partnered with Asure or not? It remains unclear to me.Anyway, it did not make ETH rise, so i doubt it will affect our price.

I agree.We still have to ask ourselves if we really need it or not?does anyone know if BTC has partnered with Asure or not? It remains unclear to me.Anyway, it did not make ETH rise, so i doubt it will affect our price.

We need Azure, but we cannot give away rights.It's a problem we now faced with.

The effect of joining in Azure is fair competition with other blockchains on Azure by equal opportunity to exposure to many users.Out of Azure means competition in adverse condition.Instant effect of price rise is secondary.

I agree.We still have to ask ourselves if we really need it or not?does anyone know if BTC has partnered with Asure or not? It remains unclear to me.Anyway, it did not make ETH rise, so i doubt it will affect our price.

We need Azure, but we cannot give away rights.It's a problem we now faced with.

The effect of joining in Azure is fair competition with other blockchains on Azure by equal opportunity to exposure to many users.Out of Azure means competition in adverse condition.Instant effect of price rise is secondary.

I still dont know what the purpose of Azure is?Is it supposed to make trading across different blockchains easier or something?

From what i gather its basically a distributed computing model which means that if you are running an Azure node, you are helping compute parts of any software running, not limited to cryptocurrencies?The fact that they are basically letting almost every shitcoin join says alot.

Are businesses only looking at Azure for Blockchains? NEM was able to network with big Japanese companies. Ethereum, before Azure, was able too as well? R3? In the future, will companies still consider non-Baas Blockchains?